My fishing activities take me a lot of different places, which I enjoy but I always love coming home to Sunset Country. I like that we have four seasons, so much beautiful country to explore and of course all of the different fish to catch. While winter can get a little long and I sometimes wonder why on earth people choose to suffer through the cold for six months of the year, the heat during the summer time in the south can be just as tough to deal with.
Between our summer and winter seasons, we have the in-between seasons where things freeze at the start of winter and thaw out at the end. This can be a great time to hang around home and stay indoors but since this is an outdoor column, we still have plenty of activities to get after outside.
As far as fishing goes, we’re lucky because there are always multiple species of fish to chase, throughout the year. Some provinces and states completely shut down sportfishing for a month or two during these in-between seasons but we don’t, thankfully. Lake trout season is closed in the fall, while walleye and musky seasons close for a chunk of the spring but outside of those, most other fish are wide open. We have bass, crappie, pike, stocked trout, perch and whitefish that we can fish for year-round. These in-between seasons offer great opportunity for many of these fish.
As long as we have open water, there is excellent fishing to be had. Stocked trout are often overlooked during these in-between frames. The brook trout, rainbow trout and splake all prefer cold water and are active during these periods, in shallow water. You can fish from shore in these lakes and have good luck, or bring in a small boat, canoe or kayak.
We have a bunch of stocked trout lakes across the region and you can look them all up on the OMNR Fish-ONLINE website. This site has a map showing where all of these lakes are as well as recent stocking records. It’s a really informative website that offers a lot of good content.
In the fall, there are plenty of opportunities for those that enjoy hunting. It’s prime time for deer, with some opportunities still remaining for grouse and waterfowl before things freeze up. Grouse hunting can still be good after we get snow, but instead of looking on the ground, focus on looking in the trees, where grouse are feeding on buds from the trees, especially birch trees. Grouse can still be found, especially on those nice evenings just before dark.
As winter is about to set in, don’t wait too long to get everything put away and prepared for winter. It’s a good idea to change the oil in the lower units of boat motors, charge and then disconnect the batteries in your boat and get them wrapped up. Adding a gas treatment to all of your gas tanks and engines is a good idea for the motors that aren’t going to see any use until spring. We should do the same thing in the spring for motors that aren’t going to see any use over the summer months.
It’s crunch time to catch up on jobs around the house but if you’re like me, fishing, hunting or hiking is a more enjoyable way to spend your day, right? Enjoy the last few nice days we have because another long winter is on its way.
